Small and medium sized businesses are being targeted by cybercriminals and email is the primary attack vector. An email filtering service can provide protection against these threats and prevent phishing and malware-laced emails from reaching inboxes.
Phishing is the leading cause of data breaches and attacks are increasing. Phishing volume increased by more than 40% in 2018 and by 65% in 2019. 90% of all data breaches start with a phishing email and 76% of businesses have reported being a victim of a phishing attack in the past year. Businesses are responding by training employees how to spot phishing emails, but cybercriminals have upped their game and phishing attempts are becoming harder to identify.
Email is also the vector most used to deliver malware. Advanced malware variants are constantly being released and signature-based detection methods struggle to block new malware threats. With phishing and malware threats sneaking past defenses, businesses are now turning to SaaS providers to provide the protection they need.
Why is an Email Filtering Service Necessary?
Most email platforms, including Office 365, incorporate a basic email filtering service that blocks most spam emails and many phishing threats. These services also incorporate antivirus protection which block all known malware threats. They can be viewed as a first line of defense that will keep businesses reasonably well protected, but they are usually not sufficiently advanced and fail to identify and block zero-day threats such as new phishing emails and malware that has not previously been classified as malicious.
Office 365 is a good example, being the most widely adopted cloud-based email service. The basic level of protection comes from Exchange Online Protection or EOP. EOP is effective at blocking spam, known malware, and basic phishing attacks, but falls short when it comes to advanced threats such as spear phishing, BEC attacks, and zero-day threats. These threats often pass through unimpeded and land in inboxes where they can be clicked by employees.
As with all areas of security, one layer is not enough. You can lock your doors, but it is wise to also install security cameras and to lock your valuables in a safe. The same is true for email security. Extra layers are required to ensure that if one measure fails, others are in place to keep you protected.
EOP is an important element of Office 365 security that is provided by default, but it can be greatly improved by layering another email filtering service on top. That will ensure that you will be much better protected against the threats that EOP struggles to identify.
How Does an Email Filtering Service Work?
A third-party email filtering service is configured, monitored, and maintained through a web-based user interface. Through that interface an email admin can set spam tolerance thresholds, set global, department, and user-level controls, monitor email activity in real time, set rules, and run reports.
Email filtering services are quick and easy to implement. All that is required is to change your MX record and direct it to your email filtering service provider. All mail will then be routed through the email filtering service, and only filtered, clean, threat-free emails will be sent to inboxes.
Since the service is cloud-based, there are no agents required on users’ devices, no hardware needs to be dedicated to filtering, and the service provider is responsible for all updates, so the solution doesn’t add to the IT department’s patching burden.
A cloud-based email filter is also highly scalable. There is essentially no upper limit to the number of mailboxes that can be protected.
SpamTitan Cloud: A Powerful, Cost Effective Email Filtering Service from TitanHQ
TitanHQ has been protecting SMBs and MSPs from email threats for more than 20 years and has developed a powerful email filtering solution capable of eliminating spam and blocking the full range of email-based threats such as ransomware, malware, viruses, botnets, phishing, spear phishing, and email impersonation attacks.
SpamTitan Cloud has been developed to be seamlessly implemented on top of email services such as Office 365 to enhance protection. The solution is easy to implement, use, and maintain. Everything is intuitive and all controls and reports are accessible with the click of a mouse through the web-based interface.
SpamTitan incorporates advanced threat detection mechanisms that are not present in Office 365 and other basic email security offerings, such as machine learning, heuristics, Bayesian analysis, greylisting, malicious hyperlink protection, sandboxing. To ensure continued threat protection the solution is regularly updated by several threat intelligence feeds. Thanks to the machine learning capabilities, SpamTitan can anticipate new attacks and provide protection against zero-day threats and sophisticated phishing and spear phishing attacks.
If you are considering purchasing an email filtering solution to block more threats, contact the TitanHQ team today to schedule a personalized product demonstration and arrange a free trial to see for yourself how SpamTitan improves email security.